Shopping In Comfort

Saturday, March 30, 2019

After referring a person who’s new to Bend to our local Bi-Mart store, I started thinking about why I like to shop there. It’s an experience maybe akin to moving around at home in a robe and scuffing in slippers. For years, I’ve been a Bi-Mart fan. It’s an Oregon chain that encourages folks to roam in comfort. The Bend store, a little small and crowded with merchandise, seems like a very-mini Costco–an attraction for those who prefer one-stop shopping trips.

Most Bi-Mart shoppers are from middle- to old-age, pretty sure what they’re looking for, and Bi-Mart understands their needs. Folks who work there are friendly about answering questions and helping to find items. The store carries common household goods, like storage supplies, paper products, selected animal care items, some canned goods and candy. It has specific-need aisles, like automotive, electrical, hunting/camping, electronic, gardening, and cosmetics. Oh, yes, wine, beer, and children’s toys.

Sometimes (especially during winter), I need to escape my house and defuse in a low-pressure environment. That may mean browsing in Bi-Mart, slow-walking through its aisles, and not wanting products but observing the store’s merchandise and how it reveals the local social environment. Its specificity to customer needs tells lots about this small city, a community of recently-arriving retirees and entrenched old-timers–folks with long-time hobbies and habits who live live in-town or out on acreages.

Yesterday, I went shopping and left Bi-Mart with a 10# bag of russet potatoes (wasn’t looking for potatoes, but at $1.99….), cans of my favorite chicken noodle soup, bags of northwestern-specialty ground coffee, horse mineral supplement, and oyster shell grit for my racing pigeon, plus horse-worming tubes and Melita cone filters. A variety haul, from a single store! Plus, no concerns while shopping about being caught in public wearing ancient field-worn jeans and dry-lot clodhoppers.

That store fulfills a wide variety of needs.

Dear Friends, Enjoy this beautiful spring day. Diana